Old Minds & New Wine

Wednesday, January 18, 2023

One day the disciples of John the Baptist came to Jesus and asked him, “Why don’t your disciples fast like we do and the Pharisees do?”  Jesus replied, “Do wedding guests mourn while celebrating with the groom?  Of course not.  But someday the groom will be taken away from them, and then they will fast.  “Besides, who would patch old clothing with new cloth?  For the new patch would shrink and rip away from the old cloth, leaving an even bigger tear than before.  “And no one puts new wine into old wineskins.  For the old skins would burst from the pressure, spilling the wine and ruining the skins.  New wine is stored in new wineskins so that both are preserved.”  Matthew 9:14-17

The older one gets, the more one looks back on the chapters that were, instead of looking ahead to the chapters yet to be written.  Perhaps too much!  It’s difficult to look ahead when your mind is full of the past.  Yet, there is something to be said for meditating on what has happened, if the future is going to make any sense.  For instance, a pastor’s unquestioned task is always to preach God’s Word, in God’s timing, so that the true wisdom of God can bless and direct God’s people.  So a pastor must face what’s ahead while keeping the past in mind.  To let the future have sovereign reign is to fall prey to some of yesterday’s mistakes, spilling the new wine of tomorrow before it has time to mature.  To let the past reign (especially in an old mind) is to turn your back on the promise of all things new. 

We make choices, many without thinking; we are conditioned so, and life demands choices and changes.  And, in the wisdom that unfolds with time, we know everything of the past was not entirely evil or entirely good, as well as we know everything new will one day be in the past.  We live, we choose, we learn.

If our minds are the wineskins of which Jesus taught, then the possibilities of the wine of yesterday or tomorrow are what goes in.  Jesus said you can’t put the new wine (of tomorrow’s experience) into old skins (an old man’s mind, perhaps).  The common reasoning is that the fermenting of the new wine creates growth action that will expand (and burst) the old, stretched-to-the-limit skins.

As it is with old minds and new wines, so it is with the church and her ebb and flow of serving Christ’s Kingdom.  The more churches dwell on the past, lamenting the loss of those good ol’ days, the less fit we become for the new wine of Christ’s promise…behold, I make all things new.[1]  And when God is moving in the hearts of young people to stretch and accept his growth to expand the Kingdom, we do well to make room for that which is coming, or risk the judgment of Pharasee-like hardened skins, ready for bursting.

I know of only one remedy for that, and Apostle Paul made it simple:

I beseech you therefore, brethren, by the mercies of God, that ye present your bodies a living sacrifice, holy, acceptable unto God, which is your reasonable service.  And be not conformed to this world: but be ye transformed by the renewing of your mind, that ye may prove what is that good, and acceptable, and perfect, will of God.  Romans 12:1-2

Renewed minds…new wineskins for what’s coming, made possible by the kind of faith that presents body, mind, and soul to Christ…the surrendered life.

For You Today  

Old wine is best in taste, but it is strong, and is meant to be savored and sipped.  New wine is best in promise, meant to be expanding and changing.  There is room for both…no, there is necessity of both in the Kingdom of God. 

You chew on that as you hit the Rocky Road; have a blessed day!

Go to VIDEO (read by author)

There are about 2,000 devotional posts and 400 sermons in the Rocky Road Devotions library.  To dig deeper on today’s topic, explore some of these: 

The Tear in the Fabric  and  Drinking the Pastor's New Wine

Images:  Title Pixabay.com   Images without citation are either personal property of the author, or in public domain.

Unless noted, Scripture quoted from The New Living Translation^©  

---

[1] Revelation 21:5

Surrender to Joy

[1]

Wednesday, January 23, 2019

One day some people said to Jesus, “John the Baptist’s disciples fast and pray regularly, and so do the disciples of the Pharisees.  Why are your disciples always eating and drinking?”  Jesus responded, “Do wedding guests fast while celebrating with the groom?  Of course not.  But someday the groom will be taken away from them, and then they will fast.”  Then Jesus gave them this illustration:  “No one tears a piece of cloth from a new garment and uses it to patch an old garment.  For then the new garment would be ruined, and the new patch wouldn’t even match the old garment.  “And no one puts new wine into old wineskins.  For the new wine would burst the wineskins, spilling the wine and ruining the skins.  New wine must be stored in new wineskins.  But no one who drinks the old wine seems to want the new wine. ‘The old is just fine,’ they say.”  Luke 5:33-38(NLT)

Cedo and Raymond lived next door to us in 1955.  They had a grape arbor off the back porch.  It had wonderful grapes, big, and juicy.  When we boys crawled under the vines down at the farthest place from the house, his Momma couldn't see us...or so we thought.  That woman swung a mean wooden spoon.  We enjoyed the new wine, but if we got caught in the grapes, she also did skinning!

Wine, in modern Western culture, is associated with substance abuse, excess.  Johann Wolfgang von Goethe said, I won't be as those who spend the days complaining of headache, and the night in drinking the wine that gives it. 

Wine has always been considered part of the joy of life.  Jesus turned ordinary water into wine to save a wedding reception.  Jesus gave wine as part of the symbolic remembrance of His supreme gift of the Cross.  Wine is also pictured in the Gospel accounts as part of God's sacred wedding reception for the Bride of Christ.  Wine plays an important role in our understanding of the Spirit-filled life.  Wine is associated with joy.  Everyone wants joy; everyone wants to be happy.

In this parable Jesus is attempting to show the religious leaders (who were upset with His methods) that their old, dead religion just couldn't handle the blessing God wanted to give them.  The wineskin stands for the way we receive God and hold Him (after all, we cannot see Him).  Our worship of God begins in the heart, the center of the wineskin of our faith.  Jesus' Gospel of love and forgiveness is the new wine. 

How do we become new wineskins?  How do we prepare to receive the Savior?  It is a matter of being made new in Christ.  People have always tried to reach up to God with their religion (be nicer, more generous, don't smoke, drink, cuss, chew, or associate with them that do).  Jesus says that kind of approach will just find the new wine of joy spilled all over the carpet.  God is not held in what we do for Him; He is received by a heart that is willing to make a complete surrender to Him.

You can become a new, expandable wineskin, ready for the new wine by completely offering yourself to Jesus.  Paul said it this way:

…you have stripped off your old sinful nature and all its wicked deeds.  Put on your new nature, and be renewed as you learn to know your Creator and become like him.  Colossians 3:9b-10(NLT)

And Christ lives within you, so even though your body will die because of sin, the Spirit gives you life because you have been made right with God.  Romans 8:10(NLT)

We call him Augustine; history knows him as Saint Augustine.  But if you read his story before his conversion it was anything but what we’d describe as a saint.  Augustine’s life was filled with lust for women and wine…as much as he could squeeze into every 24 hours.  It was degradation piled on top of debauchery. 

Soon after being converted, Augustine was walking down a street in Milan.  There he saw a prostitute he'd known. walking his way.  They passed, and she recognized him.  She called, Augustine!  But he did not answer.  She called again, Augustine, it is I.  Knowing the temptation before him, Augustine simply replied, Yes, I know, but it is no longer I.  That, my friends, is buying new wine -- putting the old wineskin of self out in the trash.  It is giving up on the idea that you can offer God anything at all.  It is simply giving up to Him, total surrender, white flag, unconditional.

For You Today

If you want to give God anything at all worthwhile…give Him YOU.  The joy will be worth it all!

You chew on that as you hit the Rocky Road; have a blessed day.

Go to VIDEO

---

[1] Title Image:  Pixabay.com

Lent, Beer and Other Festivities

[1]   

Friday, March 20, 2015

 Don’t drink only water. You ought to drink a little wine for the sake of your stomach because you are sick so often.  1 Timothy 5:23 (NLT)

Don’t be drunk with wine, because that will ruin your life. Instead, be filled with the Holy Spirit,  Ephesians 5:18 (NLT)

Paul urged his young protégé, Timothy to use a little wine to help with his stomach ailments.  Some have offered the opinion that being a pastor is an open invitation to ulcers and other gastric woes.  Largely this isn’t true about pastoral ministry, but the thought is understandable; in every area of life there are difficult people that make a hard job harder.

On the other side of the wine line, in his letter to the Ephesian church Paul warned against using too much of the stuff.  Certainly we can understand the problem associated with public (or private) drunkenness!  Paul didn’t forbid the use of alcohol; he did require moderation!

And speaking of “spirits” – here we are, dead in the middle of the holy Lenten season, and my morning news carried the story of Starkbierzeit, which, in German means “strong beer season”.  It is actually …the first of Germany’s spring beer festivals, and it focuses on drinks traditionally consumed during Lent.  The tradition was started by Paulaner monks in the 1600s, when fasting allowed the consumption of only liquids. They decided they could get nourishment through more potent beer.[2]

Isn’t that just grand?  Beer made these days has about twice the alcohol content of beer in the 1600’s, and I serve a church and denomination that honors abstinence from alcohol.  (It’s obvious Mr. Wesley didn’t agree with 17^th century monks on this one!)

Well, strong wine or beer, verses medication for the tummy, what’s a Parson to do?

I don’t really know…other than to suggest another of Paul’s statements:

Let your moderation be known unto all men. The Lord is at hand.  Philippians 4:5 (NLT)

And Solomon tells us why “moderation” is best:

Wine produces mockers; alcohol leads to brawls.  Those led astray by drink cannot be wise.  Proverbs 20:1 (KJV)

Who has anguish?  Who has sorrow?  Who is always fighting?  Who is always complaining?  Who has unnecessary bruises?  Who has bloodshot eyes?  It is the one who spends long hours in the taverns, trying out new drinks. Proverbs 23:29-30 (NLT)

And just for good measure, let’s throw in a little contemporary medical finding about the deceptiveness of alcohol.  You recall all those St. Bernard rescue dogs with the brandy casks dangling from their necks?  And did you ever hear any stories about ice fishermen drinking to keep warm?  Well, over in Sweden (a very cold place) medical research says this:

Alcohol is a dominant cause of death in urban hypothermia. Drinking alcohol gives a pleasant feeling of warmth….Longer exposure to colder environmental situations has, particularly with addition of strenuous exercise, revealed enhanced heat loss….[3]

So that first flush of alcohol going down warms you up, but only serves to hide the real effect it is going to have on your body – alcohol cools you down!  That sounds vaguely like what the writer of Hebrews said about all forms of sin…they are pleasurable for a season! ^{(Hebrews 11:25)}   And when the season is over…watch out!

For You Today

It’s hard to require total abstinence where alcohol is concerned.  But God has put common sense in our hearts and minds.

So, short answer:  read God’s Word; study and meditate on what is written and what speaks to your heart.  Balance that with the Church’s tradition, and what reasonable medical and scientific research has revealed.

And then act like a Christian who is concerned about his body (the Temple of God), his community (the people of planet earth) and his conscience; the integrity of a believer.

---

[1] Title Image: Coyau / Wikimedia Commons, via Wikimedia Commons

[2] ©NYTimesNOW daily briefing March 19, 2015

[3] Article: Alcohol and cold Department of Surgery, Karolinska Hospital, Stockholm, Sweden. (read here)0

Drunkard Road

Tuesday, August 12, 2014

Don’t be drunk with wine, because that will ruin your life.  Instead, be filled with the Holy Spirit,  Ephesians 5:18 (NLT)

If you’re driving along Route 360, about 30 miles south of Richmond, VA, you’ll pass Drunkard Road.  I can’t imagine what they were thinking.

As I had a long drive ahead of me there was plenty of time to ponder what kind of mind would come up with a name like Drunkard Road?  Almost certainly it wasn’t a real estate broker who named that street.  After all, cute is cute, but a name like that can’t do much for property values.  Living on a street reserved for “drunkards” conjures up pictures of staggering, sloppy and obnoxious.

As I re-read the last sentence (to see how it would sound) I was gripped with fear that the sensitivity-police might come and lock me up.  So let me disclose that I am in complete and compassionate solidarity with those attempting to find release from the bondage of alcoholism.  I also stand with other sinners of all kinds who despise their sin and wish to break the chains of addiction.  This includes liars, gluttons, abusers, sexual sinners, thieves and all the rest you can name. 

I condemn no person (that’s above my pay grade); I’m a fellow-sinner seeking forgiveness and cleansing.  However, having said that, I am fully inclined and committed to naming sin as sin.  Staggering, sloppy and obnoxious behavior follows drunkenness as surely as mold comes from standing water. 

But the important distinction here is the difference between behavior and trap.  Addiction is the “trap” that cripples an addicted person.  Tobacco, alcohol and other addictive substances have chemicals that trap or bind a person’s nervous system as well as their thoughts and emotions.  There’s little room left for choice.  That’s why Scripture warns against “drunkenness” of any kind – it muddies the waters of free choice.  It takes away the freedom to choose wisely, one of the characteristics which define our symbiosis with God’s image. 

Behavior is what we choose to do.  And choosing to associate oneself with addiction is never a smart, Godly choice.  It’s like living on Drunkard Road; you might not be one, but you’re flirting with it.  And, like my (and your) Mother used to say – when you lie close to the dog, you’re going to get up with fleas.

Now, having stated the obvious in several ways up to this point, let me cut to the chase:

It is fruitless and unkind to blame or condemn people caught in the trap of addiction.  They need help out of the trap.

It is just as foolish, if not sinful to remain silent when loved ones are on the verge of behavior that will land them in the trap. They need a strong warning to stay out of the trap.

For You, Today…

Got a loved one who’s flirting with the trap, or in the trap?

Are you flirting with the trap, or in it?

Scripture warns….Loving people help

See how God provides all we need?